Setback

Chris Carpenter's rehabilitation has been put on hold after the St. Louis Cardinals pitcher injured his lower back in a bullpen session. General Manager John Mozeliak said Thursday that any contribution this season from Carpenter, sidelined since February because of nerve issues on the right side of his body, would be a bonus. The 38-year-old Carpenter had been steadily progressing before the back tightened after he finished throwing Sunday. Mozeliak expected that the team would have a better handle on the situation after other doctors in St. Louis weighed in on the back issue.

Of all the indignities, this was the lowest of the low: Clippers 142, Lakers 94. It wasn't only the Lakers' worst loss ever to the Clippers. It was their worst ever to anybody. The Clippers appeared to play five-on-three that night, outscoring the Lakers in a particularly wild second quarter, 44-13, with a blaze of alley-oop dunks, three-pointers and satisfied screams exactly a month ago. "They smelled blood in the water and they killed us," Lakers Coach Mike D'Antoni said at the time.

Architect Frank Gehry's design for the planned Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial in Washington has experienced another setback, with the commission behind the memorial abruptly canceling a planned Thursday presentation in front of a federal agency. Backers of the memorial were scheduled to present Gehry's design on Thursday to the National Capital Planning Commission, a federal body that reviews development in Washington and the surrounding area. "A future date for review has not been scheduled.

Xavier Henry suffered a torn ligament in his left wrist in Friday's game, an MRI exam revealed Saturday. He will see a specialist to determine the severity of the injury. Henry might have been injured when he made a layup and stopped himself using the basket support. He played only eight games after missing more than two months because of a bone bruise and cartilage abnormality in his right knee. He is averaging 10.1 points this season. Lottery battle The 2009 NBA Finals weren't that long ago, were they?

Dodgers center fielder Matt Kemp, sidelined with a right hamstring injury since May 30, experienced a mild setback in his recovery, Manager Don Mattingly said Sunday. Kemp, who has been working out with the team after rehabbing recently at Camelback Ranch in Glendale, Ariz., was expected to return to the active roster Friday. “We've hit a little bit of a snag because he felt just a little something today still,” Mattingly said. The medical staff will watch Kemp run Sunday and assess his status.

TEMPE, Ariz. - New Angels reliever Ryan Madson experienced soreness in his surgically repaired elbow after a Feb. 1 bullpen session and hasn't thrown since, the right-hander said Monday, the day before the team's first spring-training workout for pitchers and catchers. Madson, the former Philadelphia Phillies closer who missed the entire 2012 season because of Tommy John surgery, considers the setback a normal part of the 12-month recovery process but admitted to being discouraged by it. “I'm a little disappointed right now,” said Madson, who signed a one-year, $3.5-million deal with the Angels in November and is expected to be the team's closer.

You could debate whether the Lakers were better last season with a healthy Andrew Bynum or this season with a hobbled Dwight Howard. But there's no disputing that the Lakers made the right move by trading Bynum, given the latest development with his right knee. The Philadelphia 76ers center acknowledged Friday that he might not play this season after suffering another setback in which he experienced swelling in his right knee after five-on-five drills last week. “It's getting really late,” Bynum told reporters in Philadelphia.

Japan's governing Liberal Democratic Party, under attack for a stock scandal and a new sales tax, suffered a setback in a special parliamentary election. Socialist Sadao Fuchigami defeated Kei Oma of Prime Minister Noboru Takeshita's party to gain a seat in Parliament's upper house, election officials said. In his victory speech, Fuchigami told supporters: "The people's complaints against the (stock) scandal and consumer tax led to my victory."

SACRAMENTO -- State Sen. Roderick Wright's felony verdict by a jury this week has been a major topic of news in gambling-oriented newspapers and chat rooms, with the consensus being his legal problems are a setback for efforts to legalize Internet poker in California. That is because Wright, a Democrat from Inglewood, has been chairman of the Senate Governmental Organization Committee, which handles all gambling bills, and he is the author of multiple bills over the years seeking to allow state-sanctioned poker and other games on the Internet.

PHOENIX - Former USC coach Pete Carroll said it's “definitely a setback” to the push to bring the NFL back to Los Angeles that Tim Leiweke is no longer involved in the effort. Leiweke, former president of AEG, parted ways with the company last week by mutual agreement when founder Philip Anschutz pulled it off the sales block. It was Leiweke who had spearheaded the Farmers Field concept, a deal that Anschutz still plans to pursue. “He's been an extraordinary factor in this, and he's been iconic in L.A.” Carroll, now coach of the Seattle Seahawks, said of Leiweke on Wednesday at the NFL owners meetings.

The Syrian military on Thursday captured a historic Crusader castle that had long been a highly symbolic rebel bastion, the latest victory in an ongoing offensive along the Lebanese border, according to government and opposition accounts. Krak des Chevaliers, a colossal hilltop fortress dating to the 12th century and named after a medieval Crusader order, was overrun after a series of fierce battles in the nearby town of Hossen that concluded with government troops hoisting a Syrian flag above the celebrated citadel.

TEMPE, Ariz. - Chris Iannetta hit a three-run home run and Kole Calhoun added a solo shot, powering the Angels to a 7-3 victory over the Kansas City Royals on Friday. Mike Trout had two hits, raising his Cactus League average to .409. The game had a regular-season feel to it. The Angels fielded their projected opening-day lineup, and the back end of the bullpen pitched at the back end of the game. Kevin Jepsen and Joe Smith each pitched on consecutive days for the first time this spring, with Jepsen working a scoreless seventh inning and Smith a scoreless eighth.

Plans for the revitalization of the Jordan Downs housing project in Watts have been thrown into disarray after Los Angeles officials learned Monday that the city will not be awarded a $30-million federal grant they had been counting on for the development. For years, officials have been touting their plan to spend more than $700 million to transform the derelict and often dangerous housing project into a mixed-income community of up to 1,800 stylish new apartments, along with chain stores and new streetscapes.

WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court dealt a setback Monday to the popular redevelopment trend of transforming abandoned railroad lines into public bike paths, ruling that buyers of such lands are not required to continue granting a federal right of way. Legal experts said the decision would make it harder to build bike or hiking trails in areas of the West where railroads were often built on former federal land. In some instances, local governments may be forced to pay compensation to owners whose land is now crossed by bike paths or other government-built trails and parks.

The Energy Department, dealing with twin setbacks in its long effort to deal with Cold War-era radioactive waste, said Tuesday it was stopping construction of a massive plant in South Carolina to handle surplus plutonium and proceeding with an investigation into a leak at a nuclear dump in New Mexico that exposed 13 workers to airborne plutonium. In releasing its fiscal 2015 budget, energy officials said they were stopping construction of the "mixed oxide fuel" plant at the Savannah River site in South Carolina.

A Nebraska court ruling Wednesday left the long-troubled Keystone XL pipeline with no approved route through the state, dealing the project a legal setback that could delay it at least a year. Lancaster County District Judge Stephanie F. Stacy struck down a 2012 law that gave Republican Gov. Dave Heineman authority to approve the pipeline's route, bypassing the state's Public Service Commission. Her decision came in a lawsuit filed by three property owners whose land was in the pipeline's path.

Kings defenseman Willie Mitchell, whose recovery from knee surgery was expected to take a few weeks but has lasted two months, underwent an MRI exam Monday to gauge his progress. "There was no structural damage and no setback," General Manager Dean Lombardi said Tuesday. Lombardi said the decision on when to rejoin the lineup remains up to Mitchell, who was medically cleared to play last week. Mitchell didn't skate Sunday or Monday. The team was given Tuesday off. Without Mitchell and Matt Greene (back surgery)

Mike Magee needed a big effort in Saturday's international friendly with South Korea to keep alive his long shot bid to make the U.S. World Cup team. But he didn't get it, failing to dress for the friendly because of what U.S. Soccer officials said was a case of food poisoning. Magee, the reigning Major League Soccer most valuable player with the Chicago Fire, was battling a crowded field for a spot at forward. His call-up to the national team for this winter's training camp was his first in nine years.